A/N: I apologise a hundred times for being so incredibly absent for so long. In case any of you were interested, it was totally for good cause: A levels are long over,I got the grades I needed, and I'm now just finishing off my second week at The University of Warwick =D (Doing English lit, of course. What else? =D)

I only just realised how much of a response I got for this story, and if i haven't already said so,i am incredibly greatful.

This update is specifically for KeffyRules, who gave me some of the nicest reviews I've ever gotton on this website =D Also, check out her Keffy fics_they're really good! So love to you! I really hope you like this chapter...it's an experiment I'm trying out.

Here, guys...

Xxxxxxx

It was the fucking cigarette smoke that did it.

Not, though, that Katie actually had a problem with cigarette smoke per se... she might not want to smoke the things herself, but she wasn't, like phobic or anything- too many of her friends smoked for her to be able to maintain any kind of serious problem with smoking itself while still having any kind of a social life.

It was more that cigarette smoke, in Katie's mind at least, was inextricably linked with the less-than-glamorous mental image of her and Emily's Uncle Paul, who liked his nicotine fix nearly as much as he liked painfully bright golf jumpers, heavy gold rings and not worrying about remembering to put deodorant on every day.

Which made it boarderline disturbing/hilarious that cigarette smoke also happened to hail the arrival of Effy-i'm-so-fit-and-myterious-Stonem, as well as that of Uncle Paul, and his invariable routine of knock-knock jokes...

It would have made Katie laugh out loud...except that 1) only weirdos laugh at nothing in public and 2) this meant that Effy fucking Stonem was behind her, and she really had no interest in the weirdness and unpredictability and general mindfuck that inevitably came with Effy wherever she went.

Not that she ever really enjoyed the Stonem's own personal brand of headfuck, to be honest, but today- with Em flitting casually away to London as if she was going for a picnic rather than to stand in a crowd of fire-and-truncheon-wielding possible psychopaths and shout things at another crowd of people, who would be fully capable of crushing and/or trampling a less-than-average height teenage girl, if not to death, then pretty fucking close... No. She definitely wasn't in the mood today.

She'd picked her spot in the common room specifically for its awkward position- anyone stopping by her seat would block the way for anyone trying to get past...although, thinking about it, since when would Effy care about something as stupid as that?

Just walk by...just walk by...Go on. Go to class or the cafe or home or to hell, for all I care. Just don't even think about talking to me... Come home, Ems. Please be all right. Please come home...Please don't get- No. You can't even finish that sentence. Just...be alright... Please be alright, Em...

"Katie"

Fuck.

"...Do you want something?"

The smirk. The infuriating Stonme smirk that means everything and nothing at once.

"Not particularly...At least...for now..."

"Then why are you talking to me? Because I'd really appreciate it if you could just fuck off now, yeah?"

Anyone else would have gone by now. Except maybe Cook. They're equally irritating, except that Effy is more subtle about it.

"You seemed to not want to talk to me particularly strongly today... Can practically feel it, you know"

"Whatever" Just ignore her, just ignore her, just...

"You know...we're a lot more similar than you think, Katie..."

"What?" No way does Katie want to hear whatever she and Effy have in common.

"Well...we're both alone today, for one thing. Since Naomi took Emily along with her, and Cook's probably still asleep in a ditch or something. So. We're both... cut loose"

"...What?"

This is one of the few times Katie remembers any expression on Effys face that wasn't calculated, as normal: for a second, a flicker of annoyance.

"Naomi's my friend too, Katiekins"

"Whatever. Emily's my SISTER. It's not even a fucking comparison, you know that, right?" Pause. "Besides, it's not like you even have friends. Just have people who you fuck and people who you fuck WITH."

A tiny pause, a moment of...something, in Effys face; perhaps hurt, or perhaps nothing...then she smiles lazily.

"Touche. Question is...who's who?"

There it is: the moment of breathless scrabble for a reply, inevitable when letting yourself get sucked into a conversation with Effy, who twists everything to mess you up, for her own personal enjoyment. Bitch.

"You're not the only person who cares, you know. I'm just not letting it screw with me for an entire day like" her eyes flicker "...some people..."

Katie can't even answer that at first, which makes her even angrier, and Effy just stands there and smirks at her.

"Like you give a fuck about Em!"

"I do, actually" Is that an edge in Effys voice? Is it possible that Katie might actually be AFFECTING her by her words? And if so, Katie is more than happy to exploit that to her full advantage because she's fucking had it up to HERE with the stupid mindgames...

"Oh yeah? Do you even know what could happen to her? Did Naomi mention that part of it to you?" Because she definitely told Ems, who then told Katie, who, at the time, had let it persuade her that they were doing something that had to be done.

"You know she could get arrested, right? Like, properly arrested? And you know they have horses there too? Fucking BIG horses with guys on them with BATONS and shit. Like they're gonna notice Em if she gets in the way! She gets practically knocked over in the halls at college!"

Effy blinks, looks away, looks back at her. Definite cracks appearing in the mask now. And Katie, with the perverse pleasure of gaining a reaction from Effy, who never seems to react to anything, can't resist pushing on them.

"What if it gets violent? So what...like, best case scenario, Naomi goes crazy to protect Em and they arrest her? Or, like, if they both get hurt anyway, yeah? Did you even think about that? Or even if Naomi can look after herself, d-do you really think that Em, that Em-"

She doesn't notice her voice breaking at first. She doesn't realise how blurry Effy is until she blinks wet eyelids and everything smears together.

"I-I can't look after her in London-"

And, although she won't admit it, she hadn't realised she was even thinking these things until she said them out loud. Pressing the black gulf of horrible possibilities onto Effy to make her crumble has meant pressing them upon herself: now she has said them out loud and they're concrete.

They hang heavy and irretractable around them both: What if...

Their presence wrings the sobs from Katies own throat.

"What i-if...w-what if-"

Unexpectedly, skin gently grazes her own bare arms: Effys hands coming to rest on her back, wrapping her in a patchouli-and-cigarette-smoke embrace, slightly cooler than most.

Trust Effy to not be the same as everyone else. Trust Effy not even to have the same body temperature as everyone else.

It's an irrelevant observation in the midst of her own swirling sea of panic- a split second of numbing the pain by thinking about something other than the picture she suddenly can't get out of her head: Em, getting crushed in a hoard of faceless figures, with blood at her temple, of carelessly flung bottles or bricks, or misplaced blows, of a terrified horse's clumsy, heavy hooves, of truncheons glancing off riot shields...

At the same time, in the corner of her mind that is left free to deal with the abstract and immaterial, is the question as to why and how they suddenly came to be in this position: how, exactly, did they go from Katie pressing, intentionally, too hard for a reaction, to Effy- whose only touches are all about control- holding onto her to...what, comfort her?

"Is she okay?"

It's a voice she doesn't recognise. But any display of any kind of emotion in a public place, at least, if that public place happens to be college, will inevitably draw people: not out of concern, but in their hunger for gossip. Knowledge is power, especially at school.

And the sight of Mysterious-Effy-the-highly-fuckable-enigma actually comforting Queen-Bitch-Katie is enough to draw everybody in.

She really, really doesn't want an audience for this, but Effy is already- surprisingly gently- pulling her away.

"Come on-"

And, magically, perhaps because it's Effy, or because she's Katie, or because of both of them, a path forges through the Red Sea...